Seat 6: Matthew Jarvis (16,700,000)
Hailing from Surrey, British Columbia, Matthew Jarvis is one of Canada’s remaining hopefuls (along with Jonathan Duhamel) looking to capture the Main Event crown. At 26 and with a chip stack of 16,700,000, Jarvis is in the middle of the pack in both age and the chip counts heading into November. Since making the final table, Jarvis has fared well, winning two tournaments for significant pay days. In August, he won a C$4,600 heads-up tournament at the Canadian Open Poker Championship for a cool C$100,000. More recently, he won a $1,000 no-limit hold’em tournament at Festa al Lago for just over $71,000.
How He Got There
Toward the end of Day 7, Jarvis battled with Patrick Eskander at the secondary feature table. The two were involved in a few pots and Jarvis was trending down after he doubled up Eskander. His aces fell to Eskander’s nines after they got it all-in on a king-high flop that included a nine. However, Jarvis would get his revenge.
With the blinds and antes at the 60,000/120,000/15,000 level, Patrick Eskandar raised to 240,000 from middle position. Jonathan Duhamel called in the cutoff, and Jarvis also called on the button, leading to a flop of 
. Eskander fired a continuation bet of 800,000 and got Dumhamel to give it up. Jarvis called and saw the 
hit the turn. This time Eskander checked it to Jarvis and the Canadian bet 900,000. Not seeming to mind, Eskander shoved to put Jarvis to the test. After a few moments, Jarvis called all-in for 4,400,000 and revealed 
for a turned flush, leading Eskander’s 
. Needing to avoid the board pairing, Jarvis did just that as the sealed the win for Jarvis and upped his stack to more than 13,000,000.
What To Watch For
Jarvis (Seat 6) is in an interesting spot at the table. To his immediate right are Michael Mizrachi (Seat 5) and Jonathan Duhamel (Seat 4), the most accomplished player and the chip leader, respectively. You can bet that both will be looking to establish themselves early, so Jarvis can use that to his advantage. On his left are John Racener (Seat 7) and Filippo Candio (Seat 8), both aggressive and capable players with similar chip counts to his own. Raising in front of them will be no walk in the park.
Jarvis knows that with 33 big blinds he can be patient, but can't afford to wait too long. Shortly after making the final table, Jarvis told PokerNews, “I'm not so worried about the blinds getting around to me, but I do know that the pressure is going to be on for me to do something eventually. Thirty-three (big blinds) is a decent stack where I can sit and wait and be patient and find the right spots, but at the same time the antes are big and I don’t want to be hammered too hard by them."
It will be crucial for Jarvis to get off to a good start as one misstep could limit his options to shoving or folding. On the other hand, if Jarvis can obtain some extra chips early, he can make things uncomfortable for his aggressive neighbors.